Apologies in advance as this is rather long and not sure if it belongs in Relationships (because my husband is furious with me) Mental Health or Child Mental Health 🥴
Bit of a long story, but I have suffered with my mental health off and on for years. During the first lockdown I came across some information online which made me realise I almost certainly have ADHD. All the struggles I’ve had in my day to day life, the depression, the anxiety, the self doubt and the lack of concentration all finally made sense.
Also during lockdown I was obviously spending much more time with my 9yr son that I normally did when he was at school and I was working FT. There have always been things that concerned me and worried me about my sons behaviour. He enjoys school and learning, but also gets very down on himself saying he’s stupid and he hates himself, and how everyone hates him (he has lots of friends). We went through a period where he would always talk about dying and how our lives would be better if he wasn’t around. He’d get upset with himself about one thing or another and then just say “I’m going to kill myself” This really upset me. I know for certain he had no intention of actually causing any harm to himself because he is also petrified of dying or anything to do with death and gets very anxious when anyone in the house has so much as a sniffle and gets worried they’re going to die. But I hated seeing him say those things. He has moments where he struggles with school work and throws his hands up in the air and wants to quit (I’m sure all kids do this), husband would get angry with him and they’d work on the homework together. Early on in school (years 1-3) the teachers would say he Interrupts the class And he couldn’t sit still. They would really work with him to find ways to learn and cope. We had an educational psychologist come and assess him in year 2 and he said my son was likely just still quite immature (he’s the youngest in the class) and that he was a very smart boy. Fine. Husband was completely relieved and says that those years were the hardest ever for him mentally and says how much stress that all caused him.
There are still things about my sons behaviour that concern me. At Nearly 10 he cannot sit still during a film. He is always getting up for snacks, the toilet, or to fiddle with the remote to see how much time is left. He cannot sit still at the dinner table. He’s constantly getting out and jumping on the sofa or flopping on the floor, jumping up on the counters, rocking on his chair, no matter how much I beg and plead, and eventually yell for him to just sit down. He is constantly making noises. Sometimes he will just all of a sudden make loud siren sounds, sometimes he’ll humm an annoying cartoon theme song, etc. It happens all the damn time. And it gets to the point where my sensors get overloaded and I lose my shit.
Going back to me, I got myself into such a bad state with my mental health a few months ago the prescribed me with antidepressants and therapy. Husband was not on board with the antidepressants and was furious when he found out I started taking them so I stopped. I had an initial call with the talking therapies person and I mentioned the fact I was anxious for my son and recapped the things I said above. They got very concerned about my son saying he wanted to kill himself even though I reassured him he would never do that. They told me that they would need me to call his Dr and explain and seek help for him or they would. This freaked me out so I called the Dr and told them why I was concerned. They referred him to be assessed for ADHD and recommended a few councillors for him to speak to that deal with childhood anxiety. I did not tell my husband any of this because I knew he would flip out at me. I was panicking at the fact that I was told I needed to contact the Dr about him and regretted immediately even mentioning it.
When the form came for me to fill out my husband intercepted it first and got so angry with me saying there’s nothing wrong with our son and that I’m causing life long issues for him now. Long story short I didn’t fill it out because it said if they didn’t hear back they would close his case, and that’s the result my husband wanted.
Well this morning the Dr calls my husband saying they never got the completed form back, and he’s confirmed with them he wants the case closed. But they’ve said they’re going to follow up with his school (private). We have spent the past few weeks looking at private secondary schools for my son and now my husband is livid with me for stirring this up and says I have compromised the chances for my son to be accepted into ons of the private secondary schools we’ve been looking at him getting into. Husband is furious with me.
So my question is kind of two parts: Have I ruined my son’s chances to get into his chosen private secondary school? He had no formal adhd / learning disability diagnosis on his records. He is also very smart and at or near the top of his class for most subjects. (But just because someone has ADHD doesn’t mean they’re stupid. We just process information differently).
And secondly, does my child’s behaviour (the running, jumping, the constant noises, and anxiety and self doubt), sound like that of a normal 9/10yr old? Am I worrying about nothing? I have no idea anymore. My husband is constantly telling me how I’m making issues out of nothing. He doesn’t believe in ADHD either and thinks my own self diagnosis is all in my head and that I’m looking for excuses. I am on the waitlist for a diagnosis. I’m so torn now and I just know I’m going to be made the bad person and be the brut of arguments with my husband because of all of this.